Passive Optical Networks (PONs), such as Ethernet Passive Optical Networks (EPONs), are increasingly being deployed to satisfy the growth in residential and commercial demand for bandwidth intensive services, e.g. broadband internet access. An EPON generally consists of optical line terminal (OLT) equipment in a central office and multiple optical network units (ONUs) in the field that are connected by a passive optical connection. The ONUs may be coupled, such as via coaxial transmission networks, to customer equipment of one or more residential or commercial subscribers to the EPON, such that the subscribers may receive bandwidth intensive services. Thus, the network spanning from the OLT to the customer equipment may be referred to as a hybrid fiber-coax (HFC) network.